Sam Fender has extended his run of UK and Ireland tour dates for 2024.
READ MORE: Sam Fender live in Newcastle: a star-studded Toon celebration
It comes after the Newcastle singer-songwriter shared details of the UK and European ‘People Watching’ tour last week, which is set to include stops across the UK in December – taking place in London, Leeds, Manchester and more – followed by nine European dates in March 2025.
Now, due to an “overwhelming demand”, three extra shows have been confirmed. These include a new night at Manchester’s Co-op Live on December 7, another stop at London’s O2 on December 12 and a final stop at the OVO Arena in Glasgow on December 17.
Each of the new dates marks the second show at the respective venues, and each comes one day after the originally scheduled gig in the city.
Tickets for all shows – including the three new dates – go on sale this Friday (October 25) at 10am. £1 from every ticket sold for the UK dates will be donated to Music Venue Trust in support of grassroots venues.
Find an updated list of shows below and visit here for tickets.
Sam Fender’s ‘People Watching’ tour dates are:
DECEMBER 2024:
2 – 3Arena, Dublin
4 – First Direct Arena, Leeds
6 – Co-Op Live, Manchester
7 – Co-Op Live, Manchester [NEW]
10 – The O2, London
12 – The O2, London [NEW]
13 – Utilita Arena, Birmingham
16 – OVO Hydro, Glasgow
17 – OVO Hydro, Glasgow [NEW]
20 – Utilita Arena, Newcastle
MARCH 2025:
4 – Olympia, Paris
5 – 013 Poppodium, Tilburg
8 – Halle 622, Zurich
10 – Palladium, Cologne
12 – Zenith, Munich
13 – ChorusLife Arena, Bergamo
16 – Uber Eats Music Hall, Berlin
18 – Afas Live, Amsterdam
19 – Forest National, Brussels
The tour announcement comes after the North Shields singer-songwriter teased a new announcement recently, launching a countdown clock on his official website. Billboards were also spotted by fans outside of major UK arenas earlier this month, suggesting that Fender was gearing up for his first UK tour since 2022.
Wunderhorse are joining him as special guests for the UK tour, and CMAT will be the opener for the European gigs.
The announcement that £1 from each ticket sold will be going to support the survival of UK grassroots venues comes as MVT have repeatedly called for “action not kind words” as the live music sector heads for for “disaster”, and shown that 2023 was the worst year for music venue closures.
Enter Shikari were one of the first to embrace the ticket levy. Other artists have since followed suit, including CKY and Alien Ant Farm.
A similar move has been implemented by Coldplay too, who revealed that their upcoming UK tour will see them donate 10 per cent of proceeds to the Music Venue Trust.
The shows in the UK will mark Fender’s first tour since spring 2022, as well as his first performance in the capital city since headlining Finsbury Park that same year. Since then, he has headlined Reading & Leeds Festival in 2023, and Boardmasters earlier this summer.
As well as teasing the tour dates earlier this week, Fender has also been hinting at the release date of his new single ‘People Watching’ and has told fans to “get ready” for further news incoming.
He confirmed that his third studio record was finished and “mastered” earlier this month, after sharing snippets of new material online. Fender then released a live version of ‘People Watching’ – a song he’d debuted at an intimate gig this summer.
Speaking to NME in 2022, Fender described his new music as “very pretty” with a strong “singer-songwriter” vibe.
“If I try and force myself to write stadium songs, we could end up fucking it I think,” he admitted at the time. “Instead, I want to write about the stories that I have and the place that I’m mentally at in my life at this point. And I’ve had a lot to write about.”
He is currently among the rumoured acts to headline Glastonbury Festival 2025.
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